Writing a good dissertation abstract will not come cheap on a platter of the diamond but it can be achieved if the right approach is adopted. We shall take you by the hands and describe how you can come up with a brilliant dissertation abstract that will confer legitimacy on your dissertation.
How Do You Begin?
Starting a dissertation abstract is always a challenge for students. It is important to note that if there is a false start; then the cookies will easily crumble. The statement should be one that is considered as the truth without any iota of doubt. This is the point where you are to arrest the curiosity of your readers.
If you lose them here, they will not be interested in reading through your work. This is where you should take advantage of presenting the angle of thought based on facts which will be a concise summary of your work. What can we liken the beginning to? We can liken it to when people write a proposal for several academic purposes.
The abstract comes at the beginning of a paper and it tells the reader what to expect in the body of the dissertation. This should be brief and must follow a particular pattern in line with your discipline area. You must make the first impression here which will get the reader hooked to your work.
How Should It Look Like?
Now that you have known how to arrest the attention of your reader; the next stage is to consider how the abstract is really going to look like. Your abstract can be any descriptive or abstract. Let us explain in fuller details:
Descriptive Abstract: Like the name, it is a description of the information found in the work through the use of key phrases and words. The information offered the readers might border around- purpose, scope, and methods. It is kept short and is not more than 100 words.
Informative Abstract: This is more detailed because it contains the highlights of the main findings and conclusions through the presentation of the main arguments. The length is between 250-350 words which are clearly longer than the descriptive abstract.
It is worthy of note to state here that the abstract should only consist of one paragraph which should be a representation of everything that has to do with the entire work. You are advised to go through the entire work and get a full grasp of it before penning down the abstract.
Nothing should be left to chances. Make sure you read through the work and place it side by side with the abstract. Does it represent the entire work? It is only when you are satisfied that you can heave a sigh of relief that you have achieved the aim of introducing the work to your readers in one single paragraph.
Final Thought
If you really want to connect to all your readers, then you are supposed to use plain English that will be clear to every reader irrespective of their level of literacy. You need the practice to get things right when writing an abstract that will hit the nail on the head.